Clerk Is Dropped As Defendant In Lafrankie Suit

May 03, 1986|by DICK COWEN, The Morning Call

A federal judge has dismissed store clerk Jan Orwan of Bethlehem as a defendant in a civil-rights case brought by former Bethlehem schools Superintendent Robert L. LaFrankie, his wife, Sheila, and their son, Patrick.

Judge Daniel H. Huyett 3rd of U.S. District Court in Philadelphia dismissed Orwan as a defendant in a one-sentence order.

This is the third defendant dropped from this case. In March, Huyett dismissed Pennsylvania and the state police as defendants.

The federal case arose from an Oct. 4, 1984, incident at the Merry-Go- Round store in Lehigh Valley Mall, in which Patrick LaFrankie, 18, was later charged with using a neighbor's stolen Mastercard to buy a $19.99 hat.

The LaFrankie family was outraged when Patrick was arrested a month later at the parking lot of Freedom High School, where he was a senior, and taken away in handcuffs.

The felony charges were dropped Sept. 12, 1985, in Lehigh County Court.

Late last year, the three LaFrankies sued in federal court on the grounds of false arrest.

Their allegations included one that Orwan "suddenly" changed and recanted her eyewitness identification.

Huyett, in dropping Orwan as a defendant, embraced the dismissal petition outlined by her attorney, David Scholl of Lehigh Valley Legal Services.

Scholl wrote that Orwan positively identified Patrick as the guilty party at a preliminary hearing in February 1985 and at a suppression hearing in Lehigh County Court in May 1985.

"She never 'changed' or recanted her testimony in any court proceeding," Scholl said.

Scholl noted that the Supreme Court has held that any witness in a criminal proceeding is immune from suits from damages arising from the performance of duty as a witness.

"Orwan clearly should not be discouraged from performing her public duty of repeatedly testifying in an emotionally charged case by the prospect of thereby becoming a defendant in a lawsuit herself."